Sunshine After the Rain
by SoularFlare
Summary: The follow-up to 'By Any Other Name'. Neko/Haru one-shot.


The follow-up to By Any Other Name. Rather than this being a long arc (I have issues tending to and keeping up with those…), I've decided to do a series of ficlets. Viva la Nekozawa/Haruhi! I've also decided to stick with the Shakespearian theme.

There was no way he could have stayed the same. How could he, when the first wave of complete acceptance had washed over him, when brown eyes stared up so honestly at him?

Following the Nozomi incident, Umehito began designating Haruhi nearly everyday, much to the chagrin of a few Hosts and a soft-hearted thug, and the moe of the fan girls willing to accept him at their table, Renge included.  
"It's so, so…MOE!" she squealed. "The Black Magic Prince and the innocent, doe-eyed Host! The dark and the light! Kyaa!!"

They weren't all as accepting as the otaku, though, and those particular clients had no qualms about quieting their scorn and disdain. One particular day found Haruhi smiling at Nekozawa as he told her about progress being made with his sister, which caused two of the designators at the table to not-so-subtly whisper malicious things to each other. Umehito sighed and withdrew into his cloak, clutching Beelzeneff to his chest. After ten minutes of this, Haruhi huffed and stood.  
"Would you two jealous birds just stop it?" she exclaimed. The pair gasped, reprimanded.  
"Haruhi, is there a problem?" It was Kyouya, stepping over to her table.  
"I'm sorry for the outburst, Senpai, but I couldn't take their hurtful comments any longer."  
"Oh? Were they being mean?"  
"Yes, though not to me, Nekozawa-senpai."  
"Yes, they do look a bit green, don't they?" Hikaru and Kaoru observed as they slid up behind the couch Haruhi and Umehito were seated on. The older twin shook his head "Such is the life of such a cute Host, ne?" he said with a shrug. His brother agreed.  
"C'est la vie, indeed, Hikaru," he replied, giving and identical shrug of his own.  
"Ne, ne, it's not nice to say mean things about people!" Hunni cried sternly from his dangling perch on Mori's shoulder. The taller boy grunted in agreement.

Flushed with embarrassment and anger, the two girls fled the Club room, and Haruhi patted Nekozawa's arm gently.  
"Are you OK, Senpai?" she asked apologetically.  
The Black Magic Club president smiled weakly and nodded. "Un," he said softly. "Thank you."

"I'm sorry for causing such a commotion earlier," the cloaked boy said later on as the Host Club ended for the day. "Being as weird as I am, it's hard for people to accept me."  
"They didn't have to say such mean things," Haruhi replied, stoutly resolute. "I don't care if they don't come back."  
"Oh, but, I don't want you to start losing your customers! Those girls might say things about you, too!"  
The scholarship student snorted in disdain. "I don't care what anyone thinks."  
Umehito had to admire her bravery.

"Anyway, Nekozawa-senpai, why do _you_ care so much about what others think about you?"  
Nekozawa started. "W-well, it's nice to be accepted, but when you're…someone like me, it's not easy…"  
"What do you mean 'someone like me'? It's not like there's anything _wrong_ with you. I think you're fine the way you are."  
Eyes wide, the older boy flushed, and immediately, undeniably, Nekozawa Umehito felt something shift within him, something huge.  
He wanted to cackle in his patently maniacal way to cover up how shocked and flustered he was, but what came out shocked him more than the five Hosts and red-haired Yakuza prince that were interested in his conversation with the cross-dressing girl.

What came out scared him as much as freed him.

What came out was a genuine, honest-to-goodness laugh, and the stunned Hosts watched when as he laughed, he started crying bitter tears that ran down pale cheeks.

That day, something in Umehito cracked, and in the days that followed, that crack grew wider. He began standing a bit straighter. He no longer averted his eyes as he walked down the hallway. When he heard whispers as he passed, he brushed them off. Something was happening to him, he was changing, and he _liked it_. So when he forgot his wig one day, he barely noticed. Even when others pointed out that something was different about him, and '_was that blond hair_?!' he simply shrugged. Even when his family maid called him frantically after finding it half-shoved under his bed, he hummed noncommittally.  
"I don't really need it, thank you."

Little by little, it seemed that his shell was breaking. The _fait accompli_ came when Haruhi came upon him one afternoon a few weeks later in a third-floor hallway with his hood down, staring out of a window. In the sunlight.  
"N-Nekozawa-senpai?!"  
"Hm?" He turned to look at her, the light shinning off of his blonde hair. "Oh, Fujioka-kun, going to Host Club now?"  
Haruhi was stunned silent in the gleam of his angelically pale features. "N-Nekozawa-senpai…is everything OK?"  
Umehito looked slightly confused. "Yes, fine, thank you. Why do you ask?"  
"Well…you know…you know you're in the sunlight, right?"  
And instead of waking up from the stupor he was in and shrieking in fear like she thought he would do, he chuckled excitedly. "Yes, yes, isn't it great? Yesterday Kirimi and I were able to play outside in the garden for over an hour!" Smiling more gently, Nekozawa pointed outside. The cross-dressing host came to stand next to him to see what he saw. "It's been a long time since I've seen the world in the light. There were many things, _good_ things, that I had forgotten. But now I remember." Looking down at her, he blushed. "And it's all because of you. Instead of thinking of other people, and what they think, I've learned that it's _my_ opinion of me that counts. That and the good opinion of the people I care about."  
Haruhi listened to her upperclassman, her brown eyes wide. After a few moments of silence, she smiled the same smile she gave him those weeks ago when he had been unjustly complaining about Kirimi's choice in a name for Beelzeneff's sister doll. "I'm glad to hear it, Nekozawa-senpai."

_Love comforteth like sunshine after rain_.

Gods, how true were those words, written by a true romantic who relished the tenderness as much as writhed in agony over the bitterness of this complex emotion? Taking in her smile, a smile that was a bright as the rays outside, Umehito decided that the rain was over, and he was ready to let in the sun.


End file.
